security

It was a rough day in Europe with ransonware hitting banks, airlines, utilities and other businesses. Many businesses closed early in Europe. Some businesses in the US with parents in Europe were also infected.

WPP is one of the largest advertising and marketing firms in the world.

Deloitte acquired most of the assets of Day1 Solutions Inc., a cloud consulting firm to provide deeper cloud expertise. CIO Magazine explains, "Deloitte needs Day1 for the same reason Accenture needs Genfour, Genpact needs Rage Frameworks and Infosys needs Panaya. The problem for Deloitte and for every traditional services company is that their clients do not believe they have the digital skills to lead the digital transformation journey the clients want their business to undertake."

Coming at you from the Channel show in Vegas, where TelePacific reveals its new brand as TPX Communications. Tele and Pacific didn't fit a managed services provider with a nationwide reach. TPX is more interested in selling UCaaS, managed IT, SD-WAN and managed security these days. The name change is to reflect that.

I received 2 notices in 2 weeks about hacks that got my email address and other personal information. This after not one, but 2 huge hacks at Yahoo! that affected me also. It is not a question of IF but WHEN you will be hacked -- and what you must do about it.

"Only two months into 2017 and already 13 million people have had personal information compromised.

According to Lookout Security, "More than six million user accounts and personal records were breached in January alone. Nine major companies were compromised, including Sanrio, the owners of the Hello Kitty brand; Supercell, a popular mobile gaming company; and Popeyes Louisiana Chicken, a well-known fast food chain. And 44 percent of the January breaches included stolen passwords, Social Security numbers or dates of birth. These pieces of personal information are valuable to criminals, since they may be able to sell it online to identity thieves." Maybe change your password from password or your child's DOB to something a little secure.

OBIHAI, Grandstream, Yealink, Yeastar and VoIP Supply were just a few of the booths at ITEXPO with desk phones. While many say that the desk phone is over, there are still companies that say Not So Fast! They were pretty much hanging out in Ft Lauderdale last week.

One of my favorite authors is Marcus Wynne, who is CEO of a cognitive neuroscience firm. On his blog, he espoused: "There's this thing from psychology ... which is called, I think, "normalcy bias." In sum it's the thinking that goes like this: "It hasn't happened to me, therefore it cannot happen." It's a presupposition which provides an unconscious (as in you don't even know you know/believe it) foundation for action and planning. The cure for it generally is a harsh one, when reality sticks it's sometimes ugly nose in and says, "Hey Sweet Cheeks?